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 2 Though to indicate in general terms the nature of the Roman-Dutch Law is a matter of no great difficulty, precisely to define its extent in time or space is not so easy. Derived from the two sources of Germanic Custom and Roman Law, the Roman-Dutch Law may be said to have existed, so soon as the former of these incorporated elements derived from the latter. Undoubtedly such a process was at work from very early times. Long before the Corpus Juris of Justinian had been ‘received’ in Germany, the Codex Theodosianus (A. D. 438) had left its mark upon the tribal customs of the country now comprised within the limits of the kingdoms of Holland and Belgium. Later, the various influences of the Frankish Monarchy and of the Church and Canon Law forged fresh links between Rome and Germany. The general reception of the Roman Law into Germany and Holland in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries completed a process, which in various ways and through various channels had been at work for upwards of a thousand years.

For many centuries after the dissolution of the Frankish Empire there was no general legislation. Under the rule